TODAY’S MANNA WEDNESDAY, JULY 18, 2018. TOPIC: EVERLASTING FOUNDATION

TODAY’S MANNA

WEDNESDAY, JULY 18, 2018

TOPIC: EVERLASTING FOUNDATION
TEXT: ISAIAH 28:1-8
1) THE KEY VERSE: 
“Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste” (Isaiah 28:16).
2) THE TEXT:

(ISAIAH 28: 1 – 8 KJV)
“1. Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower, which are on the head of the fat valleys of them that are overcome with wine!
2. Behold, the Lord hath a mighty and strong one, which as a tempest of hail and a destroying storm, as a flood of mighty waters overflowing, shall cast down to the earth with the hand.
3. The crown of pride, the drunkards of Ephraim, shall be trodden under feet:
4. And the glorious beauty, which is on the head of the fat valley, shall be a fading flower, and as the hasty fruit before the summer; which when he that looketh upon it seeth, while it is yet in his hand he eateth it up.
5. In that day shall the LORD of hosts be for a crown of glory, and for a diadem of beauty, unto the residue of his people,
6. And for a spirit of judgment to him that sitteth in judgment, and for strength to them that turn the battle to the gate.
7. But they also have erred through wine, and through strong drink are out of the way; the priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink, they are swallowed up of wine, they are out of the way through strong drink; they err in vision, they stumble in judgment.
8. For all tables are full of vomit and filthiness, so that there is no place clean.”
3) THE MESSAGE:
i) The curse brought upon Israel by Jeroboam was still taking its fatal toll nearly 200 years after, in the days of Prophet Isaiah. 
ii) Jeroboam had contravened God’s laws and erected idols in Bethel and Dan to prevent the people from going to Jerusalem to worship God in the temple. 
iii) It was a grievous transgression that led successions of kings with generations of Israelites following after his idolatrous way. Scores of decades after, Jeroboam was described as the man “who did sin, and made Israel to sin.”  
iv) In our passage, God employs Prophet Isaiah to preach against Israel which had been ruled by a line of evil monarchs starting with Jeroboam.
v) God warned that they should not be carried away by the beauty of Samaria, the idolatrous capital of Israel.
vi) The situation had not changed many years after Jeroboam “made an house of high places, and made priests of the lowest of the people, which were not of the sons of Levi… sacrificing unto the calves that he had made: and he placed in Bethel the priests of the high places which he had made” (1 Kings 12:31,32). 
vii) Isaiah warned that God would visit these erring people with His wrath. He said God’s anger would come in the form of the fearsome Assyrian military. The soldiers would constitute an “overflowing scourge”. 
viii) As a Christian, you need a firm base on which to construct a lasting foundation which must stand against the onslaught of the enemy. 
ix) This immovable and invincible base can be gotten from the Omnipotent God. On Christ alone, lies enduring foundation that those who dare can build upon.
4) THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: 
There is no rust of trust in Christ.
5) BIBLE READING IN ONE YEAR: 
ISAIAH 23-27
Good morning